IMPACT: Apex court has overturned Centre’s business-friendly changes to forest law, and ordered it to go back to court’s previous definition of forest. A @reporters_co investigation had exposed how gov’t diluted protection to forestlands for businesses.

reporters-collective.in/projects/fores… 2. Modi govt's changes to forest law went against Supreme Court's landmark 1996 order that all lands satisfying dictionary meaning of forests be given legal cover. @nit_set & I exposed how gov'ts undermined SC's directions reporters-collective.in/trc/forest-con…

🧵1. The Supreme Court sat on the #ElectoralBonds Scam too long. The Union gov't has built a more comprehensive (and simple) surveillance system over all manner of political funding. All kinds of donations to every political party.

@nit_set & I reveal. Stay with us and read 👇🏽 2. The gov't now has a new way to gain exclusive access to granular details of political donations. To all parties. This disclosure will come from donors themselves. All law enforcement agencies will get the data. Citizens, yet again, will remain in the dark.

#Thread A poor woman is declared rich; a living man dead. Their food and pension stopped by govt.

These are not isolated cases. Faulty and opaque algorithms used by states are deleting thousands of poor across India and denying them their rights.
reporters-collective.in/videos/ai-seri… 2. Bismillah Bee is 67 and lives in an urban slum in Hyderabad. Till 2016, she had access to subsidized ration. But that year her ration card was deleted. In 2021, her application for a new one was rejected after over 4 years of waiting.

Reason: Her husband owned a car.

🧵 Baba Ramdev used to once talk of ending black money. But his Patanjali group has a web of shell firms that trade in Aravalli forests for huge profits.

@shreegireesh & I at @reporters_co studied hundreds of corporate & land records to expose their modus operandi.

Read on 👇🏽 In 2015, Haryana CM offered Ramdev a Cabinet Minister rank. He declined. He said, the gov't and the Centre and state were his anyway.

He was right.

Haryana gov't ensured that portions of Aravallis didn't get legal cover. Allowing dubious real-estate firms to profit off them.

1. 🧵 #ForestsForProfit

Modi govt's amended forest conservation law exposes India's forests to exploitation by private players.

The gov'ts efforts to do so, bypassing tribal rights, began at least 8 years ago. @nit_set and I reveal official docs and evidence.

Stay with us. 2. Before we jump into the story. We at @reporters_co are releasing the full set of documents behind the investigation. Includes many docs that the gov't wouldn't share. You can find all the papers here:

reporters-collective.in/projects/fores…

🧵1. Before the deluge of rains hit North India, Uttarakhand CM was lobbying the Centre.

To prepare for monsoon? No.

Our investigation reveals: For hasty approvals to continue mining 4 rivers, even during rains.

In 5 days, he got it.

My colleague @aggam_walia & I tell more 👇 2. On 18 February this year, CM Pushkar Singh Dhami met Union environment minister and party colleague, Bhupender Yadav in New Delhi.

He gloated about it in a Facebook post.

He requested Yadav to hurry approvals to continue mining four rivers. And Yadav assured he would.

THREAD 🧵1. India is launching a controversial new carbon market. To trade in greenhouse gases. Why should citizens care about some companies making legit (or illegitimate) money from selling tonnes of a gas in a market?

I and my @reporters_co colleague @nit_set explain 👇🏿 2. A similar market collapsed earlier for the lack of strict caps on emissions for companies. Despite that, the govt is starting off without any caps at all.

🧵 #Thread:

#Uttarakhand has become a communal tinder box.

@HemantGairola25 & I uncovered how it's a concerted campaign of hate, running on impunity and state support. It's fueled by leaders from the BJP and its affiliates. While the police acts blind. We collected proof. 👇 2. Let's first zoom into Uttarkashi district's hill town of Purola.

May 26: Two men caught allegedly in a bid to abduct a minor Hindu girl. One was a Muslim, other a Hindu. Both were in the town for business.

This incident was given a communal spin.

#Thread: The Union gov't wants to become the judge in cases it's an accused.

It has proposed new rules to take down news from online platforms once PIB (govt's publicity arm) calls the news 'fake'.

Let me show you how malafide and bad 'PIB Fact Check' business of the gov't is: 2. I work at The Reporters' Collective @reporters_co. In June 2022, I exposed Centre's move to make Aadhaar compulsory for children under 6 to get nutritious food. The story was based on hard documentary evidence I had scooped out from govt files.

1. #Thread: A Fact Check

Recently Union environment minister Bhupender Yadav
and Congress leader Jairam Ramesh engaged in a heated debate.

Ramesh said Modi government diluted tribal rights. Minister Yadav said no rules or law had been diluted.

Who was telling the truth? 2. First, what triggered the argument between the two?

A change in the Forest Conservation Rules. The rules lay down how the Union government gives licences to industries and miners to chop down forests for their projects.

1. India has three environment laws to protect against pollution plus dozens of orders and govt notifications to check violators and an army of officials across the country to monitor and penalise them.
But does this army really do its work? Stay with me please. 2. Our dirty rivers and polluted air are evidence enough that the machine fails more often than it succeeds. But how do polluters get away with it?

# Thread: 1. Today we revealed how the Centre has made Aadhaar compulsory for beneficiaries of its nutrition programme, SNP. Which feeds children below 6, pregnant/lactating women.

Published in @Article14live. You can read it here.
article-14.com/post/millions-… 2. The Centre responded by calling the news "fake".

#Thread: How India countered WHO death estimates using its own flawed set of data. When it had a better option.

WHO's damning report pegged India's 2020 deaths at 100.51 lakh. Out of these, 8.30 lakh were Covid-linked deaths, it said. 2. Centre said 81.15 lakh deaths registered in India in 2020. This was 99.9% of all deaths, meaning 81.2 lakh people died in 2020. Not 100.5 lakh. Govt alluded since its estimate was within normal range of total annual deaths, WHO's claim of 8.3 lakh Covid-deaths was impossible.